Category Archives: LEGO

You’d probably expect a lot of the posts on a LEGO website like The Brothers Brick to be about LEGO, and you’d be right. If you’re browsing this page, you might want to consider narrowing what you’re looking for by checking out categories like “Space” and “Castle.” We’re sure there’s something here that’ll fascinate and amaze you.

LEGO Chinese Festival 80107 Spring Lantern Festival [Review]

I think we can all agree that 2020 was a rough year. Here at the tail end of things, it feels like I’m constantly on the lookout for cheerful things. Luckily, there are few distractions sweeter to me than looking over a brand new LEGO set. And when that set ties into a fresh and hopeful outlook for 2021? So much the better! LEGO 80107 Spring Lantern Festival was announced at the 3rd China International Import Exhibition, and will be available to buy on January 10th, 2021. It’s not technically a New Years themed set, as the Spring Lantern Festival occurs, oddly enough, in the spring. (But just work with me, here.) This set set is part of the Chinese Festival theme, includes 1793 pieces, and will retail for US $119.99 | CAN $159.99 | UK £89.99. It has eight minifigures, two modular Festival areas, and even a light up Ox Lantern statue. Sound fun? Read on and see for yourself!

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

Click to read the full hands-on review

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How to build your own LEGO snowman [Instructions]

Building a convincing minifig-scale snowman is a challenge, even for the pros. We’ve seen a few odd ones in previous LEGO Advent Calendars, that’s for sure. But once we go to a more medium-scale, Tiago Catarino shows us that it only takes a few common pieces to build a snowman perfect as a seasonal decoration, ornament, or something to keep around all year long.

Click here to view the instructions to Tiago’s snowman build!

Bearing gifts, we traverse afar

Many of us know the story of the birth of Jesus. We’ve seen the Nativity scene possibly hundreds of times in our lives, whether it be in storybook illustrations, our own simple scene set up on a fireplace mantle, or an elaborate life-sized diorama adorned in lights. As familiar as this may be to some of us, we still get a kick out of it when someone does the scene justice in LEGO. This year a builder by the name of byMartin dazzles us with this well-detailed rendition featuring The Three Wisemen bringing gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh to the newborn king. I’m particularly loving the thatched roof of the manger cleverly constructed from tan Technic pins. This scene truly takes us back to over two-thousand years in Bethlehem. I can just about hear the camels braying and the sand rustling gently under their feet.

Regardless of which religion you may or may not follow, it is nice to be reminded occasionally that goodwill towards others is an important and beautiful thing. From all of us here at The Brothers Brick, we hope you have a joyous holiday season and a festive and fruitful new year.

2020 LEGO Advent Calendars, Day 25

Merry Christmas, everyone! Hopefully today is one of the best days of 2020 and that you unwrapped several LEGO sets from under the tree.

We wanted to share a few more insights into this year’s LEGO advent calendars before the holiday season ended. These include leftover parts, minifigure collections and scenic displays that you can make with your advent calendar. Let’s jump in, shall we?

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Feeling blue? So are these monkeys.

The Temple of Twin Monkeys by Caleb Saw has nice part usage, but also a hefty dollop of mystery. For example, just what are these twin guardians protecting? (My guess is the legendary great lost shipment of Blue Food Dye #2.) The use of grill tiles for fingers works really well, and I like how their use as toes melds into the pedestals. The repeated use of 2×2 dome-bottom bricks for mouth adds uniformity and a touch of sculptural feel to idols, too, while the eyes are some excellently used train wheels. The temple itself has some great details in the curved stonework at the base, and the lines and leafy overgrowth give things a sense of age and neglect. If you came across this temple, would you explore it? Or would it be better not to monkey around?

For what it’s worth, there is an animal called a blue monkey, but they’re not quite this vibrant. Personally, I’d like to see more creative takes like this so we can buff up our LEGO monkey archives. So go get to building!

Shortlist announced for The Brothers Brick LEGO Creation of the Year 2020 [News]

For fifteen years The Brothers Brick has been highlighting the finest LEGO creations, and while 2020 hasn’t been the year any of us might have expected, it has still seen the global community of builders put together some amazing models. To celebrate ongoing creativity during a challenging period, The Brothers Brick team has taken a look back over the last 12 months and pulled together our selection of the best LEGO creations of 2020 for our fifth annual LEGO Creation of the Year award.

Take a look at the fantastic models we’ve shortlisted, and stay tuned for the announcement of our LEGO Creation of the Year 2020 on New Year’s Eve!

Be sure to check out the LEGO Creation of the Year 2019, 2018, 2017 and 2016 to see what honourable company this year’s nominations are keeping.

Click to see all of 2020’s nominees

The Child is all we want for Christmas, really

Disney+ has done a phenomenal thing with Star Wars: The Mandalorian. They’ve satisfied seasoned fans while also bringing in younger viewers, a feat that the newest Skywalker saga movies struggled with. The driving force uniting viewers both young and old is sometimes called by the chronologically inaccurate moniker of “Baby Yoda”, though some go with “The Child”, and others go by his newly revealed and more spoiler-y name. Whatever you call him, Pascal Hetzel gives us what we’re all after with his latest LEGO creation. He’s taken the official set, 75318 The Child, and given it a Santa outfit. Add a festively ornamented Christmas tree with presents and you pretty much have the formula for success right there! From all of us at The Brothers Brick, here’s hoping your holiday season is as happy and bright as this little guy here.

Before you go, be sure to check out Pascal’s other work and our other Christmas posts in our archives.

2020 LEGO Advent Calendars, Day 24

Happy holidays to all of our fellow LEGO builders! As is tradition, we at The Brothers Brick have been opening our advent calendars as we count down to Christmas, which is tomorrow! Today, we’re opening the final door, but we’ll be back once more when we’ll be showcasing a final roundup of the calendars tomorrow.

Thank you to all those who have celebrated with us so far. Now, let’s open door 24!

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This tiny spaceship has your back(pack)

The use of minifigure accessories in spaceship builds is nothing new, but LEGO designer Chris Perron takes it to a new meta level by building a snazzy micro-fighter that uses retro Blacktron 2 jetpacks as key elements. The nice part usage doesn’t stop there, though. Check out the droid leg as a tail fin, and the white ingot and classic solar panel in the nose.

If you like this little guy, be sure to check out Chris’ other spotlighted builds. My personal favorite is the giant Aquanauts Shark. What’s yours?

Ho! Ho! Oh no! Santa is stuck!

2020 has been a hard year for everyone, and some of us have put on a few extra quarantine pounds. Ian Hou’s LEGO Santa Claus is no exception, as evidenced by the quarter round bricks shaping his belly. It seems that Jolly ole Saint Nick misjudged how many milk and cookies he’d been eating.

Now a previously comfortable slide down a chimney is a bit more than a tight squeeze! I think Santa jumped in pretty fast and built up some speed too because of the angle on those hinged bricks tell me chunks of that chimney are flying off pretty quickly. And I think he’s noticed too, the 1×3 arches forming his mouth look like his “Ho! Ho! Ho!” has turned into an “Oh! Ow! Ow!”

Imperial Nebulon cruiser is ready to take the fight to the Rebellion

The Nebulon B medical frigate was certainly one of the most unusually shaped ships in the rebel fleet, but the rebels weren’t the only group to fly this iconic vessel. The Empire had a model as well. In fact, the Nebulon B escort frigate, manufactured by Kuat Drive Yards was originally manufactured for the Empire. This LEGO model by Remco Rohaan measures almost 150 studs in length. If you look closely at the top of the ship, you’ll notice a docked Lambda-class shuttle.

The model features some excellent lighting effects, particularly in the engines, to give the blue engine plumes the perfect glow.

2020 LEGO Advent Calendars, Day 23

Happy holidays to all of our fellow LEGO builders! As is tradition, we at The Brothers Brick will be opening our advent calendars as we count down to Christmas. We’ll also be sharing commentary on each one, which will be both insightful and hilarious!

This year we have new Harry Potter, Star Wars, City and Friends advent calendars to open. We will be sharing images of the new calendars every day through Christmas, and hope that you’ll join us! Let’s see what there is to open on Day 23.

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